eMedicine.com, an online medical reference service based in St. Petersburg, Fla., has announced the launch of its new internet site for Continuing Medical Education units. With this new release, eMedicine claims to be the largest repository of CME in the world with over 30,000 available credit hours for physicians, nurses and pharmacists.

eMedicine features articles that have been approved for continuing education for physicians, nurses, and pharmacists by the University of Nebraska Medical Center and Nebraska Council for Continuing Pharmaceutical Education. Each article, or chapter, is approved for 1.5 hours of credit, including category 1 AMA PRA CME for physicians, CE units for nurses and pharmacists.

The company is also nearing approval of Continuing Education for pre- hospital providers, physical therapists, respiratory therapists and optometrists. Eventually, over 70,000 hours of continuing education will be available to health professionals.

Each unit of 1.5 hours will be priced at $7.50, with discounts for institutional subscribers. ``eMedicine will be one of the most economical ways a medical professional can have access to online continuing education training,'' says Scott Plantz, MD, co-founder of eMedicine.com. He added that those obtaining continuing training through any institutions subscribing to the eMedicine service will receive free CME tracking and discounts on other eMedicine products, such as downloads to Personal Digital Assistants and Handheld Computers.

eMedicine.com is currently undergoing evaluation at over 2000 hospitals in the United States, Canada and Europe. A version for public libraries is also available.

eMedicine also operates the online Emergency Medical Reference, which has been available since 1998 and has seen over 20 million users. Nearly 10,000 physicians are already serving as authors or editors for the site. All content undergoes a strict peer-review by four physicians and a doctor of pharmacy.

eMedicine was founded in 1997. The company created the Group Publishing System, a patented web-based authoring, content management and delivery system to create the online medical reference. The company is privately held with headquarters in St. Petersburg, Florida, and offices in Omaha, Nebraska; Syracuse, New York; Boston, Massachusetts; St. Louis, Missouri and Washington, DC.